The timing of this report is great because this this “off season,” we at Seagate were getting serious about adding some real speed to our lineup.

The best baseball teams have great speed and the capacity to hit, pitch, and play defense. According to Gartner, Data centers are no different.

Clearly, for leading storage makers like Seagate, it’s never been a matter of “if” we would embrace SSD as the future of high performance storage, but “how and where”?

To keep the baseball metaphor going…it’s time to get serious about adding some speed and get these runners on the bases. With a PCIe SSD, a SAS based SSD, and a low cost SATA based SSD, the bases are now loaded, and waiting in the on-deck circle is Seagate – the company.

The difference between hitting a grand slam and striking out ultimately comes from years of practice, experience in reading the pitcher, and making educated guesses at what pitch is coming next. It comes down to execution. Executing not only from a product portfolio perspective, but in terms of data center customer service and support, manufacturing yields and supply assurance, and on-going research and development to not only be relevant in the SSD space, but lead.

Let’s face it, Seagate has a packed lineup with players that can run and hit for average:

And, if our plans for an enterprise solid state hybrid drive (SSHD) come to fruition this year, you can add that fresh new bat to the lineup. That makes 9 players, each with their own role in the game – a team. Just like any team, you’re not going to win by playing offense only…you need solid pitching and defense, and that is where executing on our product roadmap, supply, and support will ultimately determine if Seagate can take home the ring. It’s a long season, and I’m feeling pretty good about our lineup, it now comes down to executing the game plan day in and day out.